This invention relates to a server construction for efficiently and conveniently maintaining the temperature of chilled wine or other beverage or food in a container.
The conventional way to either chill wine or maintain the coldness of wine while the wine bottle sits on a table, counter, etc., is to place the wine bottle in an ice bucket filled with ice and water. Typically, a cloth napkin is also placed over the wine bottle. This method, although effective, is messy because the bottle and bottle label are made wet, become slippery, and may drip on the table or counter top when removed from the ice bucket. Also, the ice bucket is quite bulky and cumbersome to handle.
A number of proposals have been made for improving upon the above-described methods of serving chilled wine, and some of these are discussed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,564,165, 2,068,384, 3,302,428, 4,037,428, 1,999,670 and 3,282,068. These proposals, however, generally either are not very effective in maintaining wine in the chilled condition over desired extended periods, are still bulky and cumbersome, require prechilling of the cooling device and the placement of the cooling medium about the bottle, or generally have the same disadvantages as does the conventional wine cooler or ice bucket, or both. Chilling wine, of course, can easily be accomplished by placing the bottles in the refrigerator some hours before serving. What has been needed is a convenient, compact, attractive, immediately effective, and mess-free arrangement for maintaining the wine at the table or bar at the refrigerator temperature over periods of time of up to two hours.